Bob Hope Airport has lost its convenient edge

September 10, 2013

In the multitude of articles dealing with Burbank’s troubled Bob Hope Airport, many reasons are put forth for its loss of business, such as changing trends in travel and the economy in general, but as a 20-year resident of Burbank it seems to me that a key reason travel is down at the airport is the fact that one can often no longer use the airport.

Not too many years back I was able to depart from Burbank for almost all my travel requirements. The airport was extraordinarily convenient, manageable, affordable, and it allowed me, my family members, and out-of-town guests to avoid the hellish ordeal that LAX had come to symbolize.

Now we find we must frequently use LAX, and our visiting friends who are forced to arrive in Los Angeles say “What happened?” What happened was the Bob Hope Airport lost utility with the loss of flights (American, Jet Blue, now Southwest), a cycle that will continue if prices rise to offset the dollar loss and carriers scale further back due to reduced demand.